(Radio Iowa) — Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley says the Army Corps of Engineers should give flood control a higher priority in its management plan for the Missouri River. Grassley spoke with a crowd of farmers and others from the agriculture industry at a town hall in Malvern late Friday afternoon. “The environmental issues worry more about animals than you do people. I think people ought to be the prime concern of the federal government,” Grassley said and the crowd applauded.

Grassley says the dams along with Missouri River were funded by a 1944 federal law called the Flood Control Act.  “Now you’ve got 10 other things they take into consideration and flooding — I don’t even know whether it’s the primary one,” Grassley said. “…We spent three years after the 2011 flood (addressing Army Corps-related issues) and it looks like we accomplished nothing.”

Grassley spent Friday touring flood damage in southwest Iowa with USDA Under Secretary Bill Northey and Iowa Agriculture Secretary Mike Naig.